Chevron Deference Stacks the Deck

The federal government has a hidden wild card. When farmers face the creep of federal agency regulation, the game is consistently tilted in the bureaucracy’s favor, and although they know the deck is stacked, most farmers are unaware of the joker concealed in the government’s sleeve: Chevron deference.

Born of an environmentally-related Supreme Court case in 1984, Chevron deference allows judges to defer to agency interpretation when “ambiguous language” is found in federal law. However, because ambiguous language is splashed across regulatory and environmental law, Chevron deference provides a massive boost to government agency authority. The implications for agriculture are heavy when the same agency can make and interpret rules.

Chevron deference has a sledgehammer impact on agriculture, notes Roger McEowen, Kansas Farm Bureau professor of agricultural law and taxation at the Washburn University School of Law. “It has tremendous influence on producer activity and private land ownership. WOTUS [Waters of the U.S.] and Endangered Species Act interpretations are just a couple examples of how deferring to the governmental agency’s interpretation of the law impacts activity on private property,” he explains. “This is part of an ever-expanding bureaucracy where courts cede authority to an unelected bureaucratic body to decide what the law says. That is the root of the problem, and it infects so many areas involving farmers. Frankly, it’s unbelievable.”

“Farmers have to understand what is happening,” he says. “The same agency that writes a rule is the same agency called on to judge the rule. If you get in a rule dispute with USDA, where did the rule come from? USDA. When you finally get to a court, the judge is going to uphold the agency interpretation of the law at issue unless it is ‘arbitrary and capricious.’ A farmer or rancher doesn’t often win a battle under that standard.”

Gary Baise, Washington, D.C., attorney with OFW Law, says producers must recognize the reality of Chevron deference because the standard continuously surfaces in agriculture-related legal issues: “The agency writes the rules. The same agency then interprets the rules. The same agency then gets the court to back up its interpretation of its own rules. It’s just crazy, and you can’t make it up.”

Baise was directly involved in the settlement phase of the benchmark Duarte case in California. In 2012, producer John Duarte gave permission to grow 450 acres of wheat to a business associate who hired a local operator to till the ground with a Case IH Quadtrac and Wilcox ripper. When the Quadtrac was spotted by an Army Corps of Engineers field agent, the fuse was lit on a tangled legal saga.

The acreage contained temporary vernal pools, which form in low field pockets after rains, typically several inches deep and one-hundredth of an acre in size. In February 2013, Duarte received a cease-and-desist letter from the Corps, warning him over “unauthorized work in aters of the U.S.,” and adding the threat of potential fines and imprisonment.

Duarte was found liable of breaching the Clean Water Act (CWA) for plowing the 450 acres and faced a $2.8 million direct fine and $40 million
plus in mitigation penalties. In August 2017, Duarte settled with the government: $330,000 in civil penalties and $770,000 in wetlands credits. It was a bitter pill for Duarte, concluding a five-year legal nightmare brought on by inches of tillage. In the end, Duarte couldn’t evade CWA interpretation of a bureaucracy intent on regulating his farming practices.

Likewise, a bizarre and ongoing frog case in Louisiana places the effects of Chevron deference in bold relief. Edward Poitevent has lost private property rights on 1,500 acres near Slidell, La., to the dusky gopher frog, a species that will never live on his land and doesn’t live in his state. Even so, Poitevent can never freely develop or sell his own land.

Poitevent hopes the U.S. Supreme Court will hear his case against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service yet this year. So far, the service has won each court battle, partially thanks to a boost from Chevron deference.

Mark Miller, a senior attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation, explains Chevron deference allows courts to abdicate their decision-making role: “The feds can do as they like and then hide behind Chevron. Courts often are happy to defer to agencies. Chevron absolves them and then there’s no need to look behind the curtain.”

Ryan Walters, attorney with the Center for the American Future at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, says Congress is also to blame for the Chevron deference tangle because legislators pass broadly-worded laws and then punt to the agencies. Essentially, Congress takes the glory and then leaves it up to the agencies to fill in the details.

“Congress gets off the hook for tough decisions, taking credit for the good purposes in vague laws while leaving the agencies to impose the costs. Chevron empowers executive agencies to change what laws really mean, and this is very important for agriculture,” Walters explains.

“Farmers should know that one of the reasons average Americans don’t hear about these things is because actions of agency employees don’t get the attention from the public that elected members of Congress receive,” he adds. “At some point members of Congress have to answer to their constituents during re-election. But anonymous bureaucrats in government agencies can make decisions that have a large impact on people’s lives, without the public having any way to hold them accountable.”

Whether eventually addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court or knocked down by the pending Regulatory Accountability Act, Chevron deference currently affords agencies the power to decide the meaning of laws they’re only supposed to enforce. By extension, this allows agencies, instead of the legislature, to make laws. Critics believe the incongruity begs a classic question for farming’s future: If unelected government agency bureaucrats have the power to interpret the language of law, who regulates the regulators?

When agencies clash with farmers, Chevron deference is the default that tilts the legal battle in favor of the agencies before litigation even begins, McEowen says.

“Most farmers don’t have the money to go through an administrative process that is already tilted against their favor, just to get to a court of law,” he adds. “If they do get to court, the judge applies the arbitrary and capricious standard of Chevron, and the farmer has a very difficult time prevailing.”

When dealing with administrative agencies, McEowen advises producers to seek legal counsel at the start of a conflict, even if the case seems contained at the county level.

“It’s very likely a case will be appealed by the given agency in D.C. and moved out of the county. Once it leaves a county, a farmer contends with unknown faces and Chevron,” McEowen explains.

After administrative remedies are exhausted, the only factor a court will consider is the established record to see if the agency acted in a way that was arbitrary and capricious. McEowen has seen repeated cases where lack of a proper evidentiary record ended in a farmer loss.

“Time and again, I’ve seen farmers go through the whole process without a lawyer. They go through the process, finally get to court and hire a lawyer. Too late: The trial court dismisses and the government wins because there’s no record to review,” he notes.

“I tell farmers that you can’t do this by yourself. You have to have legal counsel that is good in handling the administrative agency appeal process and also knows the underlying legal issues like Chevron deference,” McEowen concludes. “Otherwise, it’s a near shoo-in that you will lose.”

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ZorconWestern, NE11/3/2017 09:13 AM

So, if a judge is found to have applied this chevron deference, it would appear to me that they are unfit to judge and should be removed from the bench. I firmly believe that judges should be replaced on a regular basis. Just like we need term limits right down to the county level of government. Interesting article.